Diary of a Teenage Atheist

Hi. My name’s Emily and I’m 14. I’ve been athiest for about a year. I haven’t told my parents, and I still go to church with them. I don’t have the heart to tell them. Anyway, I’ve found one other atheist, my best friend. All of my other friends are very religious. I’m afraid to tell them, because a few will probably dump me right off, but I really want to keep them as friends. I want to tell them, but it will get spread around school, and I see what happens to others. I always stay out of religous discussions. What should I do?

Well, Emily, you might be asking the wrong person about this, because I’m not one of those very vocal, “I’m an atheist and everyone knows it!” types. But since you asked, I’ll give you my perspective.

As I’ve mentioned before, I follow a “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy when it comes to my atheism, except when the person is very close to me and I can feel that he or she wouldn’t turn on me upon finding out. I’m not ashamed of my atheism, mind you, it’s just very annoying to have to be armed with counters to various inane arguments all the time (”Then where did the universe come from?” “That’s just a phase, right?” “Why is this world that we live in so beautiful?” and other fun crap). There’s also the risk of making your relationship awkward with whoever it is you’re talking to. Even with people you’ve just met, like what happened with me a week ago at a movie premiere:

TA: “I think this movie would appeal to all denominations. I mean, I’m an atheist and I’m totally interested in seeing this.”

Elderly Woman: “Ah.”

TA: “And what did you say your job was again?”

Elderly Woman: “I’m an organizer at our local parish.”

TA: “I see. Cool.”

[awkward silence ensues; TA and Elderly Woman eventually excuse themselves to go talk to other people]

Let me tell you, though, it’s very liberating to be open about your beliefs, which is why I’m slowly becoming more confident in discussing my atheism with others. I think that’s what you could do, too. You don’t have to have a big “Coming Out” party or anything, just try to work your way into becoming more comfortable about your beliefs.

If you feel like your friends will reject you for being an atheist, you don’t have to tell them just yet. You can approach the friends you feel closer to and try to get a feel of how they might react; for example, you could start by asking them about their thoughts on religion and atheism. This is actually what I did with my religious friend, Martha (”How do you feel about atheists?”), and that went pretty well. I also told my friends from school about my atheism after a long discussion on religion (I had a post here, around November 2007, but I deleted it by accident. *cries*).

I don’t want to resort to cliches here, but I do believe you’ll know the right time when it comes. It’s when you feel like there are a million things you’d rather do with your sixty minutes than go to Mass with your parents. It’s when your upper lip starts to twitch when your friends all agree that “all fags should go to hell.”

It’s all a matter of priorities, Emily. If you feel like preserving your friendships at the expense of keeping your beliefs hidden is the better idea, no one’s stopping you. If you can’t stand it anymore and you feel like you need to speak up, that’s okay, too. There is no right or wrong answer here, it’s completely dependent on what you feel would be better for you.

Let me know how it turns out! And if you feel like my advice isn’t enough, feel free to browse through the comments section, because my readers usually have better ideas than I do.

M’kay? Seriously, this office is TMI Central. I’m just a kid, let me flounce around in my weirdo outfits and devil-may-care grin without having the weight of your problems on my shoulders. Don’t you hate it when people tell you shit without you asking for it?

Just when I’d forgotten about my problems with Carl and Mrs. Carl (he quit, by the way — and oddly enough, I kind of miss him), Nikki comes into the picture with an issue of her own.

22-year-old Nikki (named after, yes, the song “Darling Nikki”) is the girl in your office who will stop at nothing to draw attention to herself. Some will be greatly annoyed (dude, nobody likes Nikki), while others, like me, only feel sorry for her. Just some silly girl with a histrionic personality disorder, is all. She’s essentially the office whipping girl, to the point that it drove her to tears once.

Still, it’s not like the derision is completely unfounded. Nikki would proclaim to anyone who asked that she used to model on the catwalk (still does part-time, supposedly), and everyone else would be like “…Really?” And I’d be one of those people. I’m not trying to be mean here, but Nikki, who might be model-ish from the neck down, is Broomhilda from the neck up. No kidding. She’s all splotchy and blemished and crooked-nosed, the kind of ugly that isn’t even modelesque ugly but just plain ugly ugly. She also brags about having expensive clothes, but when you ask her which outlet she got it from, she takes ten seconds to respond and then gives a wrong answer (read: she’s making it up). Nikki is the annoying kind of person who wants everyone to think she’s well-off, but it’s clear to everyone that she’s, well, not.

Let’s get one thing straight, though: unlike many of my co-workers, Nikki is not a bitch. The girl means well, she’s just a little off her rocker.

One day after hours, everyone else has gone home and it’s just me and Nikki, so I chat with her because I’m not picky about who I befriend. I’ll talk to whoever approaches me. She confessed that the pressure of everyone talking about her behind her back was really getting to her, particularly the latest gossip that she’s supposedly going out with one of our bosses, Kyle, even though he already has a girlfriend.

Now, weeks before my one-on-one with Nikki, I’d already spoken to some of my other (admittedly bitchy) officemates about her. One of them told me the whole situation, explaining that Nikki had a huge crush on Kyle and was now lying to people by claiming that they were in some secret relationship.

Back to where I left off, Nikki was like, “I can’t believe people would make up stuff like that, just for fun.” As a target of their rumor-mongering myself (I apparently have relationships with a couple of the bosses and several of my guy officemates), I just shrugged and explained that it was their nature to do that kind of thing.

Half an hour later, we’re standing outside the building, and she asked, “TA, are you good at keeping secrets?”

“Sure, yeah.”

“I have to tell you something,” she confessed. “But you have to swear not to tell anyone.”

“I won’t.”

She got this weird expression on her face. “…It’s true.”

(more…)

Hooray, somebody finally wrote in to ask me for advice!

I would have answered this sooner, but my PC frickin’ ate my thousand-word response. Spurred on by the promise of a love letter (yay!), I finally got my lazy ass around to writing a new one. Feel free to give your own input to help Luke out.

Hello, My name is Luke(Kinda obvious). I’m 17, and I currently live in the USA. I guess this fits under personal problems. I’ve been an atheist for awhile now…about 4 months I believe. Before I became an atheist I was a Lutheran, and basically attended church every Sunday. One day I realized that “God” is hurting this world, people fight wars over Religion ect. I finally came out to my mom about a month ago, funny thing is, she said as she grows older she’s been having some atheistic thoughts as well. She basically agrees with most of my ideas and beleifs on religion. I don’t care to tell my dad, since he’s a Lutheran yet he never attends church. I guess my family life is ok, it’s school that is a bitch.

My school is basically very stereotypical. Almost every student in my high school is either a “Red neck” or an extremely religious teenager. Since I don’t care much for trucks or country music I tend to befriend the religious types. I’ve came out about my atheistism to my best friend, he accepted it, didn’t think less of me, told my other two close friends, and they accept it just fine. It’s everyone else that I tend to care about that is a problem. A few days ago I was talking on AIM in a buddy chat room with a few other friends. We were all talking for awhile, and some how Gay Marriage and Religion came up. Of course, all the people were against it, I for one, am for it. I gave them my reason which mainly came out something like this. “You’re against gay marriage because the bible says it’s a sin? Well, the Bible also says a parent is allowed to stone their child if he disobeys, maybe the bible doesn’t have all the answers”.Not sure if that whole stoning thing is actually in the bible, my mom told me, so eh. After a few more statements, they asked if I was an atheist. And being the honest bastard that I am, said I was. Every since then, they’ve all been ignoring me, seeming to look down on me. One ever said I was going to hell, to bad it doesn’t exist eh? They all seem to think I’m a bastard who has no morals what so ever.

So, I’m kinda stuck, basically the whole group of people who I used to consider friends (Besides the 3 I mentioned earlier) Think I’m “evil” or a “satanist” of some sorts. Funny thing is I used to respect a lot of these people and thought they were more intelligent then this. The one person who doesn’t think this way is this one girl, who says she doesn’t hate me or anything for me being an atheist, but she acts like it so the rest of her friends don’t ignore her. I guess I can’t blame her . So I guess this is my real problem, do you think I should just fake being religious again. It would probably be a lot easier on myself if my school didn’t look down upon me. And my best friend’s girlfriend lumps in this crowd, so it’d probably be easier on him since he’s whipped as hell. Or do you think I should just stand up to beliefs, and fuck them all. Funny thing is, I don’t hate or look down upon them for their beliefs. I don’t try to shove my atheistic ways down their throats. I don’t talk behind their back either. Even if I did become their friends again, I’d probably wouldn’t ever respect them the same way again. Damn, looks I’ve rambled. Well, thanks for reading.

First of all, Luke, I admire you for being so honest about your beliefs, even when faced with consequences like that. It definitely takes balls. Hell, you’re more forthcoming than I am — I wouldn’t lie to people and say I’m still Catholic, and I do sign the “Religion” portion of application forms with “Atheist” (that might be technically inaccurate because atheism is not a religion, but whatever), but I practice a “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, and I tend to avoid joining in discussions when they turn to religion. So, good on you for being out and proud.

Being in an environment like that is definitely tough, and I hate that prejudice is still so prevalent, even among young Americans. You say that you like these people despite how they’ve treated you, and that’s all well and good, but…are they really worth keeping as friends? Because if I were in your shoes, I wouldn’t bother trying to pander to people who don’t like me anyway. Why would I want to be friends with someone if it meant that I’d always be wondering in the back of my mind if he secretly hates me? Things would be great if you got to be friends with everybody, but real life doesn’t work that way (at least judging from my experience).

Faking being religious may seem like a good idea at first; I did consider it myself for when I go to college. But the more I thought about it, the worse it seemed. If you’ve read even a few entries on this blog, you’d know how little I think of my family, and how my atheism changed their perspective of me. I could have pretended to “find Jesus” again to get back in their good graces (or just get Mother Dearest to stop bitching). But I didn’t, because I realized it would have been <i>pure torture</i> for me, and it became clearer and clearer to me that it just wasn’t worth it. What I did instead was seek solace in my friends, who, no matter what their religions were, accepted me for who I am. I learned to stop caring about what my family thought of me, and once I did that, I finally felt happy with myself. That’s the key question, Luke: What is more important, that they like you, or that you like yourself?

Stop caring, I say, and find better friends. Even that chick who only pretends to hate you isn’t worth hanging around, because she clearly values her reputation over her friendship with you. How popular we were in high school doesn’t matter in the long run, anyway, at least from what I can tell. I’ve got co-workers who used to be high school cheerleaders, and are now just bitter, pizza-faced hags, having retained only their rancid personalities. The totally-out-of-it stoner dude who always zoned out in class and was made fun of by the other, “smarter” kids? He’s now my boss, Mr. McKenzie, well put-together, smart, and hella sexy, with ladies all falling over themselves just to get to talk to him. (Not me, though. I’d do him, but only when offered. :P)

If you really want to repair your friendships with these people, though, don’t lie to them. That shit will get tired, eventually. Instead, try to prove that despite your differences in beliefs, you are still a good and compassionate person. As they would say, “Turn the other cheek.” Hopefully, they’ll warm up to you and figure out that not all atheists are vicious, ill-intentioned demons.

I hope that despite everything that’s happened, you’re still doing well in school and in your personal life. Always keep in mind that what they say doesn’t dictate who you are. You’re still awesome!

This is steadily rocketing up to the top of my Statements That Annoy Me the Most list, simply because I hear it almost every single fucking day now from various co-workers:

You’ll understand when you’re older.

Like when I told Gina, 34, that I was planning on being one of those never-gonna-get-married types, like Oprah or Susan Sarandon. “You’re still young, you’ll understand the importance of settling down and getting married when you’re older.” Or when I told Stella, 45, that I loved this job too much to quit and go back to college like everyone else (her included) tells me to. “You’re still young, you’ll understand the importance of education when you’re older.” (I get it just fine, retard, I just want to get used to my job first and then go back to college when I feel ready.) And I’m the only one in the office who gets this crap thrown at me, because I’m apparently the wunderkind there. Whenever I’m introduced by co-workers to new people, it’s never just “This is my officemate, TA.” It always, always has to be, “This is my officemate, TA. She’s only 18!”

I wouldn’t even be entirely surprised if I profess to being an atheist and somebody replies, in that preachy, sanctimonious way that I hate so very much, “You’re still young, you’ll realize the existence of God when you’re older.”

It’s like 18-year-olds are completely incapable of making their own huge-ass decisions. These moments just make me want to stand on my desk and scream, “I’m eighteen, not fucking five!”

This is why I felt a little sad about having to cross Carl off my list of friends; even though he was kind of annoying anyway, he was one of the few people who treated me like an equal, not some little kid who needed wiser, older people to show her the ways of the world.

It all goes back to what I said before: Patronize us, and we’ll be equally patronizing right back at you. Make us feel smart, and we’ll take everything you say to heart.

Then again, maybe it’s just my hyper-bloated ego? I mean, I feel like I’m ten times smarter than these assholes, anyway (dude, Annie’s 27 and acts like she’s 12, and even she gives me that “when you’re older” horse shit), and they just feel the need to be all preachy with me because they want to make themselves feel superior to someone. Hell, I even think I’m smarter than my parents, so there you go.

I mean, do my co-workers also expect me to address them as “Ma’am” and “Sir” just because they’ve got ten years on me? (Our company has a “First name basis” policy, which also applies when talking to to superiors.) As long as Dipshit McFuckface and I are working in the same position, doing the same things for the same amount of money, he has no right to expect special treatment from me. It’s ageist. (Not that I’m not ageist myself, but anyway.)

Mind you, this little problem is not driving me to the brink, though. Yet. I’m perfectly willing to suffer the crap, if only for the equal amount of “Wow, you must be really smart then!” comments I get from people. Because like I said, I have a ginormous ego.

While waiting at the clinic for my pre-employment medical exam, I met Janice, a 45-year-old fellow applicant who had three kids, all older than I am. (Most of my co-workers are in their mid-20’s to mid-40’s. Am I intimidated? Naaah.)

Like many other fellow applicants, as well as a couple of the folks at HR, Janice was shocked to find that I was only 18 and hadn’t even set foot in college yet.

At first I thought it was a manipulative, underhanded attempt to sway my decision (in which case: Wow, she really is like my mother! Bada-BOOM!) and eliminate the competition, although I soon realized that Janice really did mean well; it’s just that, like most adults in my life — excluding a few awesome high school teachers — she was underestimating me.

I appreciate that she gives a damn about my future, but she didn’t even consider the fact that I wanted to work there. It was a beautiful office, with a great working environment (think Google), and it was a huge company. Why wouldn’t I want to stay and try to work my way up?

I’m writing about Janice because I’d like to address the older readers of this blog on how to deal with teenagers. I don’t mean to get all lecture-y on your asses, and I don’t claim to be any kind of expert on this, but this is something I’ve been subject to from both my interactions in real life, and my interactions on this blog.

As whiny and bratty as some of us might be, teenagers are smart enough to recognize when they’re being patronized. If you talk down to us like we’re just kids who don’t know any better, we’d be less inclined to listen to you. For instance, I only smiled and nodded at Janice, being equally patronizing back to her, because I knew that she was making assumptions about me based solely on my age. She felt that as an older, wiser woman, it was up to her to guide me back to the right path. (Just like my mother, and you all know how I feel about her.)

On this blog, I get a few good-intentioned comments which are marred with a tone of condescension. They don’t explicitly state that “You’re just a kid going through a little teen angst,” but the sentiment is clearly there.

If you treat us like adults and talk to us like equals, on the other hand, we’d be more likely to consider your sentiments and hold them in high regard. Two of the awesome high school teachers I mentioned above, Mr. Benjamin and Ms. Nikki, treated me like I was on their level, and as a result, they became massive influences in my life and I always gave their opinions high priority.

I’m also happy that most of my older readers communicate with me the same way. Even though I’m only a teenager, they don’t condescend to me, and I in turn respect their opinions.

Basically, make us feel smart. It doesn’t matter how dumb or clueless the teenager is; if you’re addressing us with a tone of “I’m older and therefore smarter than you, so you should listen to me,” we’re going to disregard whatever it is you have to say with a wave of the hand and a “This is, like, sooo beneath me.”

So, there you have it. This PSA was brought to you by Teen Atheist. And now I’m off to hang out with my girls at the mall, get my nails done and flirt with boys. OMG, squee!

I got waitlisted.

Well, shit.

How dumb does somebody have to be to not pass the entrance test for the school known as Everybody’s Second Choice? And, like, I picked Creative Writing, which is probably the least popular course on the list. I don’t know whether or not I still consider myself smart, but I’m definitely not the kind of smart that gets a kid accepted into college.

Perhaps this is the price I pay for skipping a whole year of school?

I’m upset right now. It’s a manly, angry-grunting, punch-the-wall kind of upset, although inside my head, I’m screaming like a banshee.

The problem is, Dream College was the only college I applied for. (This is seriously reminding me of that Justin Long film, Accepted.) I have three options: a) enroll in Crappy College, b) find a job, move out, wait a year and enroll again, c) find a job, move out, be one of those people who never went to college.

GAAAH SHIT.

I’m not sure why I haven’t updated recently. I don’t think it’s because I’ve run out of things to say, but because I’m starting to worry that my parents might find this blog and ream me. I really should work on finding a job and moving out. My mother (we’re on speaking terms now, more on that later) is sending me job advertisments now; can’t decide if that’s an un-subtle way to say “Get off your lazy ass” (because she’s made that quite clear already), or if she’s actually trying to be helpful. In any case, I’ll take it.

I didn’t want to write about Christmas, because while it was better than I’d expected — having my cousins over cushioned the blow a little bit — I still think I would’ve had more fun by myself in a hotel, getting wasted and stuffing myself with chips. After a week of the cold shoulder, Mother Dearest started talking to me again. I played along, but this certainly doesn’t make everything okay. I hate it when people expect a free pass for the shitty things they’ve done “just because it’s Christmas.” A holiday should not be enough to excuse a person for hurting someone else. So, yeah, still hate her very much, but I guess I’ll try to hide it until I can get out of this place.

On Christmas Eve, I accidentally outed myself to my cousin, John*. He was on my laptop, logging on to Radio Blog Club and for some reason, the username form said “teenatheist.” I don’t know how it happened, since I’ve never visited Radio Blog Club before. In any case, he was like, “Are you an atheist?” And I’m like “Yeah, but you weren’t supposed to know.” He asked me a few questions about it, but he was pretty okay with it.

I wish I could say more, but I’m feeling particularly numb at the moment. I’ll leave the comments section of this entry as a “Q and A with Teen Atheist” kind of thing, so if you have anything at all that you want to know about me (favorite color? actor? movie? Do you really think that ECW’s John Morrison is hot?), fire away.

I haven’t talked to that judgmental, self-absorbed bitch Mother Dearest since last Monday’s argument, and with every day that passes, I just get more and more upset about what a total asshole she’s been.

(I’m sorry, Mom. I know I shouldn’t talk this way since you pay for all my shit, but I’m angry, and when I’m angry I get irrational.)

‘Cause, really. She’s actually talking about me behind my back now. I don’t usually eat dinner, so at one of these dinners I’m within hearing range (but not in anyone’s line of sight) and I hear her whine “She’s so disrespectful and ungrateful” to my father, who’s all “I don’t want to hear it”/ “This is between you and her, keep me out of it.” Classy, Mother Dearest. Really classy.

So I figure, if she’s doing it, I might as well continue the Mom sporkage on this blog, which by the way, is the only venue where I talk about her. My friends, save for Tyler, have no idea that I hate my family this much.

The nearer Christmas Eve looms, the more upset and restless I get about the shitty Christmas that she’s forced me into. What’s worse, spending Christmas alone or spending it with a bunch of people you hate, two of whom you’re not on speaking terms with? This has “Worst Christmas Ever” written all over it.

Sure, I could take the easy way out and offer an empty apology to her so we can at least have a Christmas that looks okay, but I’m sick of getting bent over and fucked in the ass here. I’ll tell you why I won’t apologize: BECAUSE I HAVE NOTHING TO APOLOGIZE FOR. What do I say, “Sorry for being myself? Sorry for sticking to my convictions?”

Mother Dearest is so self-absorbed that she thinks all of the major decisions I’ve made are centered on her. She told me that she thought I became an atheist just to piss her off, and she thought that I chose Dream College over Smarty-Pants College because it would directly disobey her wishes. And now she thinks that I wanted to spend Christmas away from the family just to spite her. Not only is that theory incredibly narcissistic, but it’s also a huge insult to my intelligence and character. So, no, Mother Dearest, I’m not doing it to spite you, because you’re hardly ever a factor in my personal decisions. I wanted to spend Christmas at a hotel because a) I assumed that you were kicking me out of Christmas, and b) I’d rather be happy alone than miserable with my family, especially on Christmas Eve.

During the argument, she explained that she wasn’t kicking me out of Christmas, she was just trying to tell me that they weren’t going to give me any gift. (And let’s face it, she’s only doing this so she can buy that motherfucking digital camera.)

Mother: “I just feel that gift-giving isn’t a tradition that atheists follow.”
TA (snickering): “Why, because it’s written in the Bible somewhere that Baby Jesus wants you to buy each other Nintendo Wiis to celebrate his birthday?”
Mother: “No, but giving each other presents is a way to celebrate our Savior’s birth, and clearly you don’t believe in Him, so you’re not getting one.”

It’s not that I’m bitter about not getting a gift, since I got a good amount of money for my birthday, but who wants to spend Christmas with someone like her?

I apologize if it’s been nothing but ranty-ness so far, but I’m extremely resentful and I’m venting here. Moving on, here are the various arguments for Christianity that she made in her argument, which I will proceed to spork: (more…)

In tears once again. Fresh from a particularly acrimonious fight with Mother Dearest, where she let a lot of bitterness come to the surface.

Apparently, I have no right to feel offended by anything they say or do, just because I’m still living under their roof. Because they’re paying my tuition. She actually stooped to guilt-tripping:

“We spent thousands of dollars for your 18th birthday! It was a huge sacrifice for me — I opted not to buy that digital camera I’d wanted for myself because we were saving up to make you happy.”

Fucking seriously.

And she said that since they are still making these huge fucking sacrifices for me, disrespectful, ungrateful, spiteful old me (her words), I’d have to be at peace with the fact that she would always be disappointed with herself for letting me become this way. My choices — to be an atheist, to enroll in my Dream College instead of Smarty-Pants College like her — are her failures.

How could a speech like that not make any child want to kill themselves (hey, at least they’d be making a lot less “sacrifices!”)? How could she expect me to understand that I will always be a reminder of her shortcomings, and be okay with it?

She also wanted to criticize my choice to remain closeted in Dream College:

“You have to fight for what you believe in.”

You know what? Fuck you. Who are you to judge? Am I supposed to settle for a limited number of choices (the only non-sectarian institution is Smarty-Pants College, where she wanted me to go to), just because I’m an atheist? The world isn’t fucking fair, okay, and I’m going to take what I can, even if that means taking on a “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy in college. If I’m facing this much discrimination at home, imagine how much worse it would be in a Catholic college!

She accused me of taking advantage of Catholic education, which, again: IT’S A CATHOLIC MOTHERFUCKING COUNTRY, WHERE THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO GO?

Also, I’ve now been forced to stay home on Christmas Eve, because she said that going out and partying and staying at a hotel would be “too unsafe.” I agree, it is a risk, but I don’t want to be miserable on Christmas Eve. I want to enjoy myself and have a special night, with or without you.

Oh, what I wouldn’t give to be able to free myself from all this fucking drama. I wish I could run away, but no, I’m too financially dependent. I’ll probably just stay at home and do whatever she tells me to do, like the daughter she wants me to be. Maybe I should lie and say I believe in God again. After all, she sacrificed her longing to have that digital camera, just so I could have a nice 18th birthday! Because really, wasn’t it enough to see the smile on my face after I came home from the best birthday ever? I was so happy! You had to hold it over my head that it took a huge toll on you, just to prove a point? Well, thanks! You win, asshole! Now when I look back on that wonderful night, all I’m going to remember is THE FUCKING DIGITAL CAMERA YOU NEVER HAD.

People who have read this blog from top to bottom may have noticed that I have a rich smorgasbord of expletives and negative adjectives with which to describe my brother Pete. You see, swearing is a way for me to release my anger, and God knows I have a lot of anger when it comes to Pete.

Before I tell you about me and Pete, let me first tell you about my father. Throughout my life, I have been the subject of constant verbal (and when I was younger, physical — in the form of corporal punishment) abuse by him. I vividly remember a lot of these episodes, like that time in second grade when he called me an idiot just because I didn’t get a perfect score on a big exam. I walked to the bathroom, and once inside, cried silently. When I was around 7 years old, I was thrown on the bed and whipped with a belt repeatedly just because I didn’t like what was for dinner. I remember crying loudly and asking him to stop, but he only hit harder. My mother was either not around to see what happened, or when she did, she turned a blind eye to it.

The corporal punishment stopped when I was older, but the memories lingered like scars. The verbal abuse became more frequent, though, because when he would pick me up from the dormitory, he did it by himself, so Mom wouldn’t be around to witness him calling me a bitch, just because I overslept at the dorm. It felt a lot like emotional rape, really — wait until Mom is gone, then take all his rage out on me. I have a feeling he felt a sick satisfaction in watching me crumble.

The most hilarious part about this is that Dad can’t understand why we’re not best friends. Why I’m not Daddy’s Little Girl like all the other girls my age. In fact, he asked me once: “Why do you hate me so much? What have I done to deserve this?” He thinks that just because he says sorry after every time he verbally abuses me, means that what he did should be forgiven. When I admitted that I couldn’t forgive him (how could you forgive someone who will never stop hurting you?), he blamed me for being “weak of faith,” and suggested that I start going back to Church (I was still a Catholic at that time).

Readers, this is not an easy topic to talk about. I usually am able to go about my days feeling fine because I choose to block these memories, but when I think about what my father’s done to fuck up my childhood, I break down every time. In fact, in the middle of typing the first few paragraphs of this blog entry, I actually burst into tears. I’m still crying, actually. But, I carry on, because you have to understand that my angst isn’t just silly teenage angst, or emo-ness. It really did come from somewhere.

There are times when I wonder if the problem is just with me, and I’m the one who’s dysfunctional, because on the outside, we all look like good, normal people.

So, what does this have to do with Pete? I sometimes get into verbal altercations with Pete, and in those altercations I might call him an “asshole,” and whenever I do, I think, “Oh, shit, I’m turning into my father,” which is the last thing I ever, ever want to do.

Pete was also important to me because while I hated my remorseless father and controlling mother, I felt that Pete was the only person in the family I could trust and depend on. I’d told him once that when we had enough money to live on our own, we’d break away from our parents and split the rent on an apartment in New York. He could try to break into the music industry while I tried to get a job as a writer or a nurse. I honestly did see him as my best friend, and I know this sounds cheesy, but I wouldn’t think twice about giving up my own life to save his. If he ever needed a new liver, kidney, or even a heart, he wouldn’t even have had to ask. I was glad that even if I got stuck with a mostly crappy family, I had a good, kind and dependable brother.

Which is why when we had that fight and he finally revealed that he despised me, I lost it. See, with Dad, I knew what was coming, so I could at least prepare myself for it. With Pete, I was completely blindsided. Could you imagine the one person you thought you could rely on telling you the following? Verbatim:

Pete: “I’m done wasting my time on you.”

TA: “Oh? What have you done for me?”

Pete: “I listened when you had problems and no one to talk to. And listening to you whine and whine is wasting my time when I could talk to people who listen to me.”

TA: “Bullshit! My FRIENDS have heard more of my problems than you.”

Pete: “At least I did, and you didn’t even say thanks.”

TA: “I listened to all your problems, too, and you didn’t thank me either. Know what the difference was? I didn’t EXPECT any thank you. Because you’re my brother, and I’d always be there for you without you having to ask. I guess I was nothing but a burden to you, after all.”

Pete: “Indeed, you are a burden to me.”

TA: “You were never a burden to me! I cared about you!”

Pete: “Right. You telling me about care. Hell has frozen over.”

TA: “How could you be so heartless?”

Pete: “To have no heart is better than a rotten one. I curse God for being so cruel as to stick me with a horrible sister like you.”

(It’s hard to type through the tears, guys. Sorry.)

When I reached home after that exchange, I fell to the floor, sobbing because there’s nothing more painful than finding out that someone you loved very much had hated you all along. I crawled to the phone and, still in hysterics, I dialed my friend Tyler’s number. Some of the readers of this blog ask me why I insist on keeping Tyler as a friend, even though he’s a less-than-open-minded fundamentalist. Well, here’s why (sent via text message after the emotional phone conversation I had with him):

“Just so you know, I have faith in you. Know that there will always be one person in this world who is on your side, and who believes in you with all of his heart. Please take care of yourself. And I’ll always be here whenever you need me.”

I’m the kind of person who is known as the strong one among my friends. When everybody else is weak and emotional, I am usually the one who keeps a cool, level-headed front, and I talk with them through their problems. This is why I never cry or show my weak side to them — because they need someone to lean on. So when I start feeling unstable myself, I only have two people who know what I’m going through. One of them is Fred, but we’re not friends anymore (and you really don’t want to go seeking advice from someone with a plethora of personality disorders). The other is Tyler, and say what you will about his beliefs, but he has always been there for me, and I need someone like that in my life.

I got the idea to write this blog entry as I was sitting on the couch, tearing up at this scene of an early episode of Brothers & Sisters: Tommy has pulled some strings to get a job for his ne’er-do-well younger brother, Justin, and is understandably upset when Justin gets stoned on the job.

Tommy: “Look, everyone else might sit around and feel bad for you, but I won’t.”

Justin: “I didn’t ask for your sympathy, and I certainly didn’t ask for your help!”

Tommy: “When are you gonna grow up?”

Justin: “You’re just like Dad!”

Tommy: “I’m not like him. Dad never stopped caring about what you did with your life. I do. I stop right now. I stop today.”

I always cry when watching Brothers & Sisters, because it reminds me so much of my own life. When Tommy uttered those last words, I knew exactly how he felt. Sure, “fundamentalist” =/= “drug addict,” but when you love your brother that much and he just keeps on pushing you away repeatedly, well, one day you’re finally going to walk away.

I would say that the hard part about being an atheist is dealing with a narrow-minded family like mine, and losing a brother, and losing Christmas, but maybe I’m better off knowing how they truly feel about me. At least now I feel more justified in hating them.

I realize that blood is thicker than water and all that, but I’m tired of crying. And the day I stop caring about Pete is the day I stop crying over losing him.

I’m done, Pete. I’m through with you.